Overview
Barbarians, different as they might be, are defined by their rage: unbridled, unquenchable, and unthinking fury. More than mere emotion, their anger is the ferocity of a cornered predator, the unrelenting assault of a storm, the churning turmoil of the sea.
For every barbarian, rage is a power that fuels not just a battle frenzy but also uncanny reflexes, resilience, and feats of strength.
The anger felt by a normal person resembles the rage of a barbarian in the same way that a gentle breeze is akin to a furious thunderstorm. The barbarian's driving force comes from a place that transcends mere emotion, making its manifestation all the more terrible. A raging barbarian becomes able to perform supernatural feats of strength and endurance. The outburst is temporary, but while it lasts, it takes over body and mind, driving the barbarian on despite peril and injury, until the last enemy falls.
Many of the lands of Faerûn are savage, where day-to-day survival is a struggle. Such lands breed hardy tribes and fierce warriors, such as the Reghed and Uthgardt barbarians of The North and the seafaring Northlanders of the Moonshae Isles and the northernmost reaches of the Sword Coast.
Barbarians of these lands are most often humans or half-orcs, occasionally half-elves born of contact between savage human tribes and the elves of Faerûn, or tieflings from tribes known to consort with fiends. Dwarf barbarians are famed and feared warriors among the fiercely proud clans that have reclaimed territories like Mithral Hall and Gautlgrym. Barbarians of most other races hail from warmer southern lands, rather than Faerûn.
Primal Instinct
People of towns and cities take pride in how their civilized ways set them apart from animals, as if denying one's own nature was a mark of superiority. To a barbarian, though, civilization is no virtue, but a sign of weakness. The strong embrace their animal nature-keen instincts, primaI physicality, and ferocious rage. Barbarians are uncomfortable when hedged in by walls and crowds. They thrive in the wilds of their homelands: the tundra, jungle, or grasslands where their tribes live and hunt.
Barbarians come alive in the chaos of combat. They can enter a berserk state where rage takes over, giving them superhuman strength and resilience. A barbarian can draw on this reservoir of fury only a few times without resting, but those few rages are usually sufficient to defeat whatever threats arise.
A Life of Danger
Not every member of the tribes deemed "barbarians" by scions of civilized society has the barbarian class. A true barbarian among these people is as uncommon as a skilled fighter in a town, and he or she plays a similar role as a protector of the people and a leader in times of war. Life in the wild places of the world is fraught with peril: rival tribes, deadly weather, and terrifying monsters. Barbarians charge headlong into that danger so that their people don't have to.
Their courage in the face of danger makes barbarians perfectly suited for adventuring. Wandering is often a way of life for their native tribes, and the rootless life of the adventurer is little hardship for a barbarian. Some barbarians miss the close-knit family structures of the tribe, but eventually find them replaced by the bonds formed among the members of their adventuring parties.
Personal Totems
Barbarians tend to travel light, carrying little in the way of personal effects or other unnecessary gear. The few possessions they do carry often include small items that have special significance. A personal totem is significant because it has a mystical origin or is tied to an important moment in the barbarian's life.
Tattoos
The members of many barbarian clans decorate their bodies with tattoos, each of which represents a significant moment in the life of the bearer or the bearer's ancestors, or which symbolizes a feeling or an attitude. Each tattoo a barbarian displays contributes to that individual's identity.
Superstitions
Barbarians vary widely in how they understand life. Some follow gods and look for guidance from those deities in the cycles of nature and the animals they encounter. These barbarians believe that spirits inhabit the plants and animals of the world, and the barbarians look to them for omens and power.
Other barbarians trust only in the blood that runs in their veins and the steel they hold in their hands. They have no use for the invisible world, instead relying on their senses to hunt and survive like the wild beasts they emulate.
Both of these attitudes can give rise to superstitions. These beliefs are often passed down within a family or shared among the members of a clan or a hunting group.
Class Features
As a barbarian, you gain the following class features.
| Level |
Rages |
Rage Damage |
| 1st |
2 |
+2 |
| 2nd |
2 |
+2 |
| 3rd |
3 |
+2 |
| 4th |
3 |
+2 |
| 5th |
3 |
+2 |
| 6th |
4 |
+2 |
| 7th |
4 |
+2 |
| 8th |
4 |
+2 |
| 9th |
4 |
+3 |
| 10th |
4 |
+3 |
| 11th |
5 |
+3 |
| 12th |
5 |
+3 |
| 13th |
5 |
+3 |
| 14th |
5 |
+3 |
| 15th |
5 |
+3 |
| 16th |
5 |
+4 |
| 17th |
6 |
+4 |
| 18th |
6 |
+4 |
| 19th |
6 |
+4 |
| 20th |
Unlimited |
+4 |
Hit Points
- Hit Dice: 1d12 per barbarian level
- Hit Points at 1st Level: 12 + your Constitution modifier
- Hit Points at Higher Levels: 1d12 (or 7) + your Constitution modifier per barbarian level after 1st
Proficiencies
- Armor: Light armor, medium armor, shields
- Weapons: Simple weapons, martial weapons
- Tools: None
- Saving Throws: Strength, Constitution
- Skills: Choose two from Animal Handling, Athletics, Intimidation, Nature, Perception, and Survival
Equipment
- You start with the following equipment, in addition to the equipment granted by your background:
- A greataxe or any martial melee weapon
- Two handaxes or any simple weapon
- An explorer’s pack and four javelins
1st Level - Rage
In battle, you fight with primal ferocity. On your turn, you can enter a rage as a bonus action.
While raging, you gain the following benefits if you aren’t wearing heavy armor:
You have advantage on Strength checks and Strength saving throws
When you make a melee weapon attack using Strength, you gain a bonus to the damage roll that increases as you gain levels as a barbarian, as shown in the Rage Damage column of the table above
You have resistance to bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage
If you are able to cast spells, you can’t cast them or concentrate on them while raging.
Your rage lasts for 1 minute. It ends early if you are knocked unconscious or if your turn ends and you haven’t attacked a hostile creature since your last turn or taken damage since then. You can also end your rage on your turn as a bonus action.
Once you have raged the number of times shown for your barbarian level in the Rages column of the table above, you must finish a long rest before you can rage again.
1st Level - Unarmored Defense
While you are not wearing any armor, your Armor Class equals 10 + your Dexterity modifier + your Constitution modifier. You can use a shield and still gain this benefit.
2nd Level - Reckless Attack
You can throw aside all concern for defense to attack with fierce desperation. When you make your first attack on your turn, you can decide to attack recklessly. Doing so gives you advantage on melee weapon attack rolls using Strength during this turn, but attack rolls against you have advantage until your next turn.
2nd Level - Danger Sense
You gain an uncanny sense of when things nearby aren’t as they should be, giving you an edge when you dodge away from danger.
You have advantage on Dexterity saving throws against effects that you can see, such as traps and spells. To gain this benefit, you can’t be blinded, deafened, or incapacitated.
3rd Level - Primal Knowledge
When you reach 3rd level and again at 10th level, you gain proficiency in one skill of your choice from the list of skills available to barbarians at 1st level.
3rd Level - Primal Path
Rage burns in every barbarian’s heart, a furnace that drives him or her toward greatness. Different barbarians attribute their rage to different sources, however. For some, it is an internal reservoir where pain, grief, and anger are forged into a fury hard as steel. Others see it as a spiritual blessing, a gift of a totem animal.
You choose a path that shapes the nature of your rage. Your choice grants you features at 3rd level and again at 6th, 10th, and 14th levels.
Reghed and Northlander barbarians tend to follow the Path of the Berserker, while Uthgardt barbarians are nearly always followers of the Path of the Totem Warrior.
4th Level - Ability Score Improvement
When you reach 4th level, and again at 8th, 12th, 16th, and 19th level, you can increase one ability score of your choice by 2, or you can increase two ability scores of your choice by 1. As normal, you can’t increase an ability score above 20 using this feature.
5th Level - Extra Attack
You can attack twice, instead of once, whenever you take the Attack action on your turn.
5th Level - Fast Movement
Your speed increases by 10 feet while you aren’t wearing heavy armor.
7th Level - Feral Instinct
Your instincts are so honed that you have advantage on initiative rolls.
Additionally, if you are surprised at the beginning of combat and aren’t incapacitated, you can act normally on your first turn, but only if you enter your rage before doing anything else on that turn.
7th Level - Instinctive Pounce
As part of the bonus action you take to enter your rage, you can move up to half your speed.
9th Level - Brutal Critical
You can roll one additional weapon damage die when determining the extra damage for a critical hit with a melee attack.
This increases to two additional dice at 13th level and three additional dice at 17th level.
11th Level - Relentless Rage
Your rage can keep you fighting despite grievous wounds. If you drop to 0 hit points while you’re raging and don’t die outright, you can make a DC 10 Constitution saving throw. If you succeed, you drop to 1 hit point instead.
Each time you use this feature after the first, the DC increases by 5. When you finish a short or long rest, the DC resets to 10.
15th Level - Persistent Rage
Your rage is so fierce that it ends early only if you fall unconscious or if you choose to end it.
18th Level - Indomitable Might
If your total for a Strength check is less than your Strength score, you can use that score in place of the total.
20th Level - Primal Champion
You embody the power of the wilds. Your Strength and Constitution scores increase by 4. Your maximum for those scores is now 24.
Comments